‘Who, what happened?’ The wounds were new, barely healing, wide and glistening.
‘She did. She happened. A few days ago now. She would have killed me if she could.’
Dalip sat on the edge of the bed, his back to her. He watched while the two Romanian women systematically went through everything, lifting things up, moving them around, checking behind them.
‘What are we going to do with her?’
‘I don’t know. I thought I was coming here to kill her. It turned out I didn’t need to.’
‘I thought we were going to have to kill her too. But I didn’t have the stomach for it. I wanted to see if I could reason with her instead.’ He looked at her over his shoulder, her coiled-spring hair, her skin opened up in broad red trenches. ‘Was that a mistake? Stanislav seems to think so. He says if we leave her alive, then either us or someone else will become her victims. We have to remember what sort of person she is.’
‘She’s no saint. Neither am I. You might be, I guess. What do you think we should do?’ She drew up her legs and hugged her knees.
‘That the only way to stop her may be to kill her. And that I’m not going to be the one to do it.’ He shrugged. ‘I don’t know if that makes me a coward or not.’
‘A lot depends on her. If she even looks at me funny, I’ll have her.’ Mary pointed down behind her neck. ‘The last time I turned my back on her, I got these.’
‘I’m supposed to protect the weak◦– that’s what the gurus say. I don’t know who the weak are any more.’ Dalip reached into his pocket for Pigface’s knife, and considered his distorted, dim reflection in the blade. ‘This isn’t over yet, is it?’
‘No way. But at least we can do what we came here for◦– ask some questions of her, and work out if we can go home or not.’
Dalip caught her gaze, and held it. ‘Do you think we can?’
‘I’m told if we do, we’d be the first.’ She blinked her big brown eyes. ‘We might have to stay.’
He didn’t know what he thought about that, and looked away.
27
They couldn’t find any maps, just some half-complete outlines of the coast to the south, with scratches marking a few prominent features. Mary knew that this wasn’t right, that the geomancer had to have maps, because that was the whole point. How could someone hope to divide Down with criss-crossing lines of energy without detailed maps?
The wind had picked up, and the broken doors on to the balcony were beginning to heave and yaw. Dalip went to wedge them shut, while Mary went to sit opposite the geomancer, who looked up through closing eyes at the woman who’d beaten her. Her split lips reopened as she pressed them together.
‘What do we call you?’ asked Mary.
‘Whatever you want.’
‘Pick a name. Yours would be good, but any name will do.’
Mama frowned at Mary and went to wipe away some of the freshly blooming blood with a damp cloth dipped in what might be wine. The geomancer pushed her hand firmly away.
‘I’m not a cripple.’
‘You seemed grateful enough for my help before,’ said Mama. ‘What’s changed?’
‘It’s me,’ said Mary. ‘She can fool you as to what she’s really like. She can’t fool me.’
‘She’s just a—’
‘She tried to kill me, Mama.’ Mary shrugged off the tapestry. ‘She did that. She did everything that’s happened to you and the others. All this is her fault, and she can fucking tell me her fucking name right now, or we’ll go another six rounds.’
The geomancer looked sour. ‘Bell. I’m Bell.’
‘Like the Disney princess?’
‘The thing that rings.’
‘Okay. Belclass="underline" where are your maps?’
‘I don’t have any.’
‘That’s just bollocks. I know you have maps. Where are they?’
A flash of defiance burned in Bell’s face. ‘They were stolen.’
‘Convenient. By who?’
The fire flickered, and was extinguished. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘It matters to me. We want to know where the fuck we are and what the fuck is going on, and whether we can get the fuck home again. So, you’re going to tell me where your maps are, or I’ll beat it out of you right now.’ Mary balled her fists, and the muscles in her bare arms flexed.
‘A man called Crows stole them when he left me.’ Bell put her hands to her face to cover her shame.
‘Left you? Like he was your boyfriend? Oh, you have got to be fucking kidding me.’
‘You know this Crows man?’ Mama looked askance. ‘You get around, girl.’
‘Yes, I know him. He stole my fucking map too.’
‘Mercy! Will someone please, in heaven’s name, explain what is going on?’
‘Right.’ Mary glanced up to see she had an audience. The longer she left it, the more interested they became, and the more embarrassed she turned. ‘No. I’m going to let Bell do it.’ She pushed her with the flat of her foot, and the geomancer tried to slap it away. Too slow.
With the focus of attention off Mary, she moved back and waited with the others.
‘Down,’ said Bell, with a shuddering sigh, ‘Down isn’t just a direction.’
‘It’s a destination,’ said Mary. ‘Get to the good bits.’
‘Down is a world separate to where we came from, but connected to it in lots of different places and times. These places we call portals, and they’re doors where people can enter Down, but not, apparently, leave. Someone, a long time ago, discovered that if you draw a line between two portals, there’s nearly always another portal on that line. You can get villages on those lines, too. Where those lines cross, you get castles. That’s why maps are important. And Crows stole mine.’
‘She’s missing some stuff out,’ said Mary, ‘but that’s pretty much what I got from Crows.’
‘So what did I miss out?’ asked Bell. She pushed her hair back from her face, to better show off her black eyes, torn skin, and dew-drop of blood clinging to the end of her nose.
‘That the villages and the castles grow, depending on how many people live there.’ Mary watched the others’ consternation rise. ‘Those houses we found in the forest? They grew there, and were just sinking back into the ground. The same with castles. She needs people to live here in order to keep the walls and the towers intact.’
‘Is that why she took us?’ Elena was as bemused as she was angry. ‘Is that all?’
‘No, that can’t be all,’ said Dalip. ‘Why did you make me fight in the pit?’
‘Fight? Pit?’ asked Mary.
‘Like a, a gladiator. She wanted me to be afraid. Isn’t that right?’
Bell shifted awkwardly, painfully. ‘I… I was carrying out an experiment. When we came to Down, we were all running from something, someone. I thought that by making someone scared enough, I could open a portal back to London. Didn’t work though, did it? You were too bloody honourable.’
She said it with grudging admiration, but hadn’t counted on Dalip not taking it as a compliment. Luiza just about stopped him from dragging the geomancer up by the hair and throwing her through the closed balcony doors.
‘It wouldn’t have worked if I’d told you why you were being trained to fight,’ said Bell. ‘It wasn’t about you being scared. It was about those other plebs being scared of you.’
Luiza pushed Dalip away and stood in front of him. Dalip’s chest heaved, and he seemed to only control himself with the utmost effort. ‘It didn’t work at all.’
‘You can’t blame me for trying,’ Bell offered.
Luiza’s hand pressed hard against Dalip’s sternum.